LIFE IN LONDON: THREE MONTHS IN

Wow, three months ago we touched down in London! It’s been a whirlwind.

I thought I’d do a little update on how life has been. It can be best described with one word: busy!

School has been really hectic, but thankfully we wrapped up this week, and we’re now on winter break! When school is in session, we have class for the most part every day from 9-5, and then have work to do when we get home! Homework is not really a thing here - that might be because we’re in grad school or it might be the British way - so we really just have to read and study a lot at home. I had half of my final exams this week, and I’ve definitely spent almost all of my waking hours at school over the last 2-3 weeks or so. I’m not completely free though, because I have exams the first week back from break, in early January (Q has them in June).

This is our library. We love it, so that makes it easier for us to spend all our time here!

Luckily, I also have a lovely view from my lab of the Senate House building, a landmark here in London and the site of many film sets.

Still, life has been good. We’ve easily adjusted to life in London. We love how international the city is. We’ve gotten to connect with a few friends from home who have visited, which has been really nice. We’ve traveled to Oslo, Prague, and Geneva (post on Geneva coming soon, I promise!). To celebrate the completion of our first term, we are traveling to Marrakech! I’m so excited. If you have any recommendations, please leave them in a comment!

We truthfully haven’t gotten to do a ton of London touristy stuff because we planned and paid for a lot of travel ahead of time and the rest of the time we’ve been neck-deep in school work. We do plan on doing a bit of it over the winter break, though!

There aren’t a lot of things about the States that we miss. London generally feels safer, as guns aren’t really a thing here (you have to be over 25 to buy a knife!!!) and the police are few and far between. We haven’t had any run-ins but they’re supposedly actually really nice and truthfully here to help. London is expensive but it’s honestly not that bad. A lot of the touristy stuff if is a bit pricier (perhaps that’s why we haven’t done so much!), and eating out is more expensive than Atlanta, but probably on par with what you’d see in Northern California, my first home.

Our school is located in a lovely neighborhood called Bloomsbury.

Everyone says London is super rainy, and maybe we feel this way because we came from Atlanta which is on average more rainy, but we really don’t mind the weather. I think I went the first six weeks or so without an umbrella and then I lost it shortly after buying it and went a few more weeks without one again. Q still doesn’t have one. It’s mainly sprinkling when it does rain, whereas in Atlanta we are used to heavy downpour that leaves you soaking wet.

Rainy evenings in London aren’t as common as you’d think!

We miss our families and don’t get to talk to them as often because of the time difference, and we really miss our Peach, who was such an integral part of our everyday life (and who we can’t talk to!). We know she’s in good hands though, so that makes things a bit easier. We really miss our friends too, especially coworkers and people we saw often. But we’re in touch still, so it’s okay.

I’m really looking forward to winter break during which we will finally be able to enjoy London a little bit, and bringing in 2019 here in the UK!